Surrounded by hundreds of thousands
Strangers I become microscopic
Sitting on a soggy, mud-splattered
Army green woolen blanket
Completely soaked in t-shirt and shorts
Sandals mud-sucked away long ago
A brown river of primordial mud
Flows an arms length away and
And young bodies sluice wetly into
Massed oblivion somewhere down the hill
Only to watch the smiling rebels
Trying to regain the top of the slope
A slapstick revolution from top to bottom
And then familiar blue eyes caked in mud
Find mine and giant white teeth flash a smile
I know well-years ago serving together
In red cassocks and white surplices
Perfectly ironed and ramrod straight
Worshippers of a different religion
He in only shorts says I lost my stuff
I say do you want some food
He says yes and a ride home and
We listen to the star-spangled banner
The world is young, dark, and rough. But the bright light of civilization illuminates the highly advanced Island Nation of Athlan, a country of order, balance, and progress.
However, the world is changing, and what is solid becomes fractured. Amidst this epic era of devolution, the never-ending cosmic battle for control of earth has centered on Athlan. While celestial forces gather, wielding power unimagined, the Marfach Gardai, human defenders of Athlan, ready themselves for the final conflict with the lethal, mindless Armies of the Night. Athlanians, great and small, men and women, will die in bloody droves, incapable of understanding or escaping their fate as Great Athlan destroys itself. Witnessing the battle for her planet, Mother Earth joins the fray with a small but extremely potent cadre of once-women who defend the earth with their lives. In the end, everyone will become a pawn on the empyrean board of life and death, and the game is in doubt . . .
